Former FBI Director Freeh to investigate Penn State scandal

PHILADELPHIA — Former FBI director Louis Freeh, tapped to lead Penn State's investigation into the child sex abuse allegations against a former assistant football coach, said his inquiry will go as far back as 1975, a much longer period than a grand jury report issued this month.

Freeh was named Monday to oversee the university board of trustees' internal investigation into the allegations that led to the ouster of longtime football coach Joe Paterno and university president Graham Spanier.

Freeh said his goal was to conduct a comprehensive, fair and quick review. His team of former FBI agents, federal prosecutors and others has already begun the process of reading the grand jury report and looking at records.

"We will immediately report any evidence of criminality to law enforcement authorities," said Freeh, who has no direct connection to Penn State.

Former assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky is accused of molesting eight boys over a 15-year period beginning in the mid 1990s. Authorities say some assaults happened on campus and were reported to administrators but not to police.

Authorities say Sandusky, who retired from Penn State in 1999, met the children through the Second Mile, a youth charity he started in 1977. By going back to 1975, the investigation would cover the entire time the Second Mile has existed and 24 of the 30 years that Sandusky worked at Penn State.

Penn State's trustees ousted Spanier and Paterno, who they said failed to act after a graduate assistant claimed he saw Sandusky sexually abusing a young boy in a campus shower in 2002.